the wasteland

Our house is on a big lot. Well, "big" is relative, but I really do think our yard is extraordinarily large. The problem is, ever since we moved back in in April, it's looked like this.

A wasteland. Awful. Ugly. As one of our friends said, there should be a malnourished goat tied to a stake in the middle of all the dirt. Our Stake President is our neighbor and gave a talk in Stake Conference a couple months ago about how his lawn is greener than everyone else's. We got the hint! I guess the point of his talk was to make the grass green where we are, figuratively speaking. But perhaps he also thought we were bringing down the neighborhood...

On the side of our house were these trees. Beautiful birch trees. But, covered in ivy. Therefore, ugly. I could even hear the bees swarming from inside my bedroom.

Spencer and are both bigtime "do it yourself" types of people. Especially me. I hate spending money. But we wanted these trees out, and we wanted the stumps out (remember our root system from a few months ago?? That took us 3 weeks?), and we wanted it done quickly and nicely.

So, Spencer rocked it at work and got a bonus (have I mentioned I love being married to a super smartie pants?) And we hired out for the first time ever! You know, I really liked the whole concept of having workers. It was so nice to say "The workers are coming today." Way better than the alternative! And in just 3 1/2 days, our front yard (and side yard) was completely transformed! They took those trees down so fast, they added a new concrete walkway out to the sidewalk, they laid sod and even added a new and improved sprinkler system! Emma was really good at inspecting from the sidelines.

The workers finished here, and we were left to spread the mulch (we didn't want the yard to be entirely grass). The mulch ended up being a huge project so once again, we hired out--2 young men. I love watching rather than working. I really could get used to this. (The trees were on the side of the house, by where the truck is. I love how having them gone has opened up our house/lot so much.)

What do you think? Awesome, right? This walkway border was my doing, and it took a lot longer than I thought it would. But I love how it looks. We have two trees to plant still (in the mulch area), and solar ground lights to put in on the sides of the walkway. I'd like to plant a money tree too.

And our workers? Worth every single penny!